A lot of small law firms want to grow their practice. They want more clients so they can expand and do more good for the community. Knowing how to perform local SEO for lawyers is key to that growth. These days, law firms grow if clients see them on search engine results pages (SERPs), yet most don’t pay it much attention. Only a few understand that local SEO is something they must do to serve more clients. Many more think that it’s too much work, and the referral method still works in their favor.
Your firm can be a law firm that grows. Let the Local Business Marketing Solutions team help you. By the time you finish reading this article, you’ll be well on your way to success with a few local SEO tricks and a secret weapon up your sleeve.
Why You Should Pay More Attention to Local SEO
As lawyers, you’re probably used to having clients referred to you by your professional network. You most likely rely heavily on this method as your primary business source. However, the Internet has changed all this. While a referral is still good, you may need more than word of mouth to grow your practice.
Here are reasons you should pay more attention to local SEO efforts.
Potential Clients Look You Up Online
A great portion of potential clients do research online; even those referrals will do a local search before knocking on your office door.
To add, think of those who rely solely on search engines to look for a law firm. This means your pool of potential clients has become more extensive. Only local SEO for lawyers can help you sink your feet into this potential and make you visible in organic search results to do business.
Search Engines Provide More Information About Your Practice
Search engines such as Google function as an improved directory listing. When someone looks for a service, such as a law practice, the search engine provides them with all the essential details such as contact information, map directions, images of the office, and customer reviews. All these influence a potential client’s decision to do business with you.
Potential Clients Connect with Your Law Firm Online
Strategic SEO for lawyers harnesses the power of search engines to make it easy to find law firms. Local SEO makes it convenient for clients to connect with your law firm and scope it out because everything is online.
Quick Tips to Improve Local SEO for Lawyers
Getting started with local attorney search engine optimization is pretty easy. You only have to dedicate a few minutes to make these quick changes. Doing all of them will give you a significant advantage over your competitor firms and help boost your website’s search engine rankings.
Sign Up to Google Business Profile
If you don’t have one yet, create an account with Google Business Profile (GBP), formerly Google My Business (GMB). It enables you to put your business on Google Maps. When you’re on the map, your law firm gains more credibility and can compete with other law firm websites within the area.
Signing up for GBP also lets you put essential information about your practice that potential clients need to know. This includes business hours, complete address, services offered, and contact information. Doing this improves your local SEO and gives your potential clients a means to contact you or drop by your business.
Register to Other Online Law Directories
Google is a massive directory in itself. Still, consider registering your law firm to online directories specific to law practitioners. This helps you get discovered by more clients. Plus, online law directories act as an indirect source for prospective clients using the Google search engine because these directory sites are also indexed and ranked on Google.
Keep track of all the directories where your law firm is registered. This makes it easy to manage them should there be any changes.
Update Your Law Firm Website’s Homepage
Once you’ve made your law firm available on search engines, you have to ensure the information on the search engine matches what’s on the website. If they’re looking for a law firm in New Jersey, and your website says you’re practicing in New York, that’s a potential loss of credibility and business.
Constantly update your website’s home page information to match what you put out on the search engine. Then, put the finishing touches with other important website optimizations to really drive it home.
Update Your Business’s Contact Information
To ensure prospective clients can always reach you, regularly update your contact information and hours. This simple fix has a massive effect because a potential client might decide to take their business elsewhere if they cannot reach the contact number.
Check your contact information on every area of the internet you have a presence in, be it your website, your GBP, or your social media pages.
Ask Your Clients for Reviews
It’s no secret that reviews are powerful influencers. So the more positive reviews you get, the more they will add credibility to your business and attract more clients.
Reviews are like referrals, only they’re online. As much as you can, and within ethical means, encourage your satisfied clients to leave a good word. Point them to where they can leave the review by sending them your Google Business Profile link. Make it almost effortless for them to leave a review. This will help tremendously with your local SEO efforts.
Expand Your Local Keyword Repertoire
Perform primary keyword research and expand your list of keywords when updating your law firm’s website content strategy. Try exploring Google Keyword Planner and look for more keywords specific to your specialty and business area. Insert these keywords into your website’s content to boost search engine rankings.
Apart from Google, you can use other keyword research tools to expand your keyword lists and improve your law firm SEO strategy. It’s important to know the kinds of customers you serve to do this effectively. That way, you know where to find them and what search terms they use.
Make Your Meta Descriptions and Title Tags Location-Specific
Despite being unseen, meta descriptions and title tags significantly help your local SEO rankings. Adding a few words that specify where your law firm is located can help Google index your law firm’s site in the search engine results page whenever a prospective client within your area of business types a query.
You can write meta descriptions and title tags yourself, or you can hire an agency that does SEO for law firms to help update and optimize these things.
Your Secret Weapon: Local SEO Services for Law Firms
Executing the abovementioned quick fixes will help your local SEO success. There will be results, and they’re likely going to be good. But if you want more than what you expect, you can check out what law firm SEO marketing professionals can do.
We at Local Business Marketing Solutions have expertise in local SEO for law firms and can give your business a thorough fix. We use cutting-edge strategies that will enable your law firm’s website to reach its full potential so that you can attract more business.
